Eighty miles off Norway’s west coast, one of the country’s smallest oil platforms is gearing up to start production. On board, there’s no helipad and no toilet. There aren’t even lifeboats.

That’s because the slimmed-down oil platform, operated by Equinor ASA, is expected to run without anyone on board. While workers can be ferried in for repairs or other matters, the platform’s nine oil and gas wells will be controlled from a hub 5 miles away.

Jonathan Webb, the founder of a startup called AppHarvest, is building a 60-acre greenhouse in an economically distressed part of Kentucky. Will his high-tech approach help fix the flaws of the U.S. food system?